


Violence in the Pouring Rain

by worddancer



Category: Pirates of the Caribbean (Movies)
Genre: BAMF Women, Character Study, F/M, Gen, Gender Roles, Growing Up, Passion, Pirates, Women Being Awesome, Women In Power, bargins made with goddesses, finding power, gender and power, keeping it, king elizabeth swann, life - Freeform, sin - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-12
Updated: 2018-10-12
Packaged: 2019-08-01 04:16:13
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,497
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16277615
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/worddancer/pseuds/worddancer
Summary: Damn one man who agreed to a debt to save everyone else. Elizabeth did not ask what she herself hadn’t already gave. She promised herself to the man she didn’t love to save the man she did. She sacrificed her freedom to the propriety of her father until a pirate ripped her corset and saved her life.It’s true a woman’s kiss can kill a damned man.Damn him to save the rest.Cross to the end of the earth to save him.Elizabeth was always willing to fight for those she loved.





	Violence in the Pouring Rain

**Author's Note:**

> I have strong feelings about women in media and I love Elizabeth Swann. I have a lot of feelings about her character and who she was as a person. So I wrote about them. No beta.

From the moment she knew the word passion existed Elizabeth Swann felt a yearning in her very soul. Passion wasn’t allowed to angles in silk and damask but she wanted it with every fiber of her being. 

But good girls, daughters of governors, women of quality, don’t want. They wait. They listen. They learn to run households and order servants about and dance and write invitations and arrange seating charts for their husbands benefit and host dinner parties for the same. They do not want.

A woman cast Adam from the Garden of Eden for the sin of wanting. 

A woman’s gaze can turn a man to sin.

A woman’s body is the devils playing ground and should be on display but God damn her to hell if a man asks to come into her garden gates. 

For 17 years Elizabeth learned all the ways a woman could be damned. She sat quietly in her family's church pew and heard the poison dripped from the mouth of a man. Women are evil, they are weak and easily tempted. They cannot be allowed to be lead astray. 

She supposed that maybe the preacher was right. After all temptation ran in her very blood, constantly threatening to boil over. She knew the sins the preacher spat at his congregation. Lust for a blacksmith’s apprentice, lust for freedom, lust for the power of having a choice. Gluttony for the world. Pride in daring to think maybe she should have her own choice. Greed for something other than a cold marriage bed devoid of passion. Being trapped by sloth, wanting more and not being allowed to be more than decoration. Envy of listening to the maids who married for love, who wanted their children and loved their husbands. 

Women are born with the sickness of sin according to the pulpit. Eve wanted more and damned herself and Adam for the pleasure. 

How could this girl child know that soon a man from a country she had only heard of would look at her and see the power of a goddess? 

How could she know that her and this goddess would find kin in each other.

Bind the bones of the powerful and give them to men. 

A woman’s power has always been a thing to be feared. 

For 17 years Elizabeth learned all the ways a woman is damned. A shiny bird to be held in a gilded cage, kept pure, untouched by even the sun. Men sat on their high horses and damned women from their pulpits while lusting for soft bodies. 

Freedom is a man’s right and a woman’s sin.

Strength in a woman is hidden until it is the last chance. 

Pirates invaded her home. Her maid tried to hide the governor's daughter because she could only be wanted for her father's blood. (They did want her for a father’s blood, just not her own. A woman couldn’t be an enemy on her own.)

But this spoiled girl child spent her life at the knee of her over doting father. A father that let her read. A father that satisfied her lust for knowledge and her curiosity for pirates. A father who on the crossing from England let his daughter bother every sailor on the ship with her questions. 

This is a girl child who took over her mother’s duty as Lady of the Governor’s mansion. Who knew how to lead conversation, how to seat powerful people so dinner wouldn’t end in a duel. A woman who knew how to deflect men’s advances and gossips questions. The lady of the most powerful house on the island is a diplomat in her own right even if her worth is calculated in her pedigree or her wedding ring. 

She bargained for her city and for the lives of the people in it and forgot to ask for her own. 

Blood calls to blood. 

Debts bargained in blood demand payment of the same. 

Blood calls to blood and perhaps Elizabeth shared blood with the heathen goddess. After all they are kin.

Women have always been damned to debts that are not their own. The sins of Adam are the fault of Eve. 

A knife hidden in a borrowed dress cannot kill an undead corpse. A prisoner cannot escape a guard who never sleeps. Elizabeth could feel death creeping into her bones and like everything else in her life she was powerless to stop it. The ghosts demanded her blood and they would have it. 

The blood of a woman cannot repay the sins of a man no matter how much they wish it could. 

Her only power was to bargain her body, her life and her hand to the man she could tolerate for the man she loved. Once she’d been bound in the chains of her duty, once she’d been taken in the course of a bargain, one life for a city, a piece of gold for a debt of blood. Once she promised her fidelity for the life of another.

Once she choose to escape. 

Once she choose to fight.

Once she choose to feint. 

Elizabeth’s greatest lesson was learning to fight for herself. 

She forgot that it was never Will who wanted to be a pirate. Who lusted for freedom. Who dreamed of the ocean.

“I’m here to negotiate.”

“I’m listening...”

“I’m listening intently.”

Damn one man who agreed to a debt to save everyone else. Elizabeth did not ask what she herself hadn’t already gave. She promised herself to the man she didn’t love to save the man she did. She sacrificed her freedom to the propriety of her father until a pirate ripped her corset and saved her life. 

It’s true a woman’s kiss can kill a damned man. 

Damn him to save the rest. 

Cross to the end of the earth to save him. 

Elizabeth was always willing to fight for those she loved. 

Men cursed not to die. Men told to ferry the dead. Men who seek power that is not theirs to own. Men trapped beyond hell. Women trapped by men and trapped by rules and finally given the power to damn them all to hell. 

Calypso would have been proud of her unknowing acolite. 

It’s hard to believe the pulpit when you’ve seen the dead walk. It’s hard to believe in a god when you’ve seen the anger of a scorned and betrayed goddess. It’s hard to see evil in women when you’ve seen men slaughter children in the name of order. 

Pirate lords. 

King. 

Men who looked at her and saw the image of a goddess they trapped. A man made her a Pirate lord, thought her a goddess and begged her favor when he saw her strength. Jack made her king. Perhaps they were both right. 

One raised her to lord to earn a goddesses forgiveness, another made her king to win a war he started. 

It seemed she could only raise to power when a man deemed her a further means to an end. 

It seemed she learned how to fight to keep it. 

She’d take these pirates into Jack’s war, to their war, to the war for their way of life, the war for her freedom. She’d take her power no matter how she got it, no matter who gave it to her, and she’d keep it. 

After the Company left with their tails between their legs and their commander dead the eight remaining pirate lords tried to take away her throne. This war had already denied her a husband married in the heat of battle. They would not take this from her either. She drew her pistol and put a bullet between Ammand’s eyes. 

“First Mate Charlemagne- are you prepared to be Captain of your ship and Lord of the Black Sea?”

“I am Your Majesty.” the scared first mate stuttered.

“Do you swear to take no more tribute then is your due as Captain from the ships under your command?”

“I do Your Majesty.”

“Do you swear to uphold the pirate code in its entirety?”

“I swear.”

“Do you swear that all men and women shall be equal and free under your flag?”

“I swear.” at each question his voice grew stronger and more sure.

“Finally do you swear to give proper tribute to Shipwrecks Cove and the King in order to maintain the stability of our brethren, knowing you may seek shelter here at any time and you and your crew shall be defended for he who attacks one of us shall face the wrath of us all.”

“I swear Your Majesty.”

“Good, I then name you Captain Charlemagne, Pirate Lord of the Black Sea to pillage to your hearts consent. Is there anyone else who would like to challenge my authority?” 

She turned to stare at the rest of the gathered lords her pistol still up to aim at anyone else who challenged her authority. No one moved. 

“Good, then let's get to the actual business of governing. It would appear there’s been a lack of it lately. First order of business. I name my First Mate as Acting Pirate Lord of the South China Sea so I may see to my duties here. He has already taken the vow in front of witnesses. Does anyone feel the need for him to repeat it?”

She took her seat at the head of the table, her first mate taking a seat to her left as to not offend any lords by intentionally placing him at her right hand. She learned her fathers lessons well. Thrown off balance the other pirate lords began to seat themselves, all but Jack who never had bothered to stand in the first place. 

“Second order of business, what is the state of our fleet?” 

“The Pearl needs some repairs but she’s solid. We need more ships for the Caribbean- now that the Trading Company is all turned about. 

A man once spit in her face after a kiss and called her pirate. Her biggest guilt was the fact the word sounded like freedom.

Elizabeth Swann walked out to the sea and brought tribute from each pirate lord and released them into the ocean. With waves kissing her hips she whispered her apologies to the sea.

“I did not bind you but nor did I free you. However I offer this promise. You will never feel the chains of men as long as I am King of these sea’s.” Elizabeth promised a goddess she only hoped would hear her. “All I ask is you watch over Will. Keep him safe, keep him true to his mission. Let him come home to me.” 

The waves whipped up higher around her but never catching her feet in the undertow. As the salt and brine stung her eyes and tangled her hair Elizabeth swore she heard a voice in the ocean soft as the sand beneath her feet and louder than any raging hurricane. The goddess voice filled her head and rattled her bones.

“Chil’, de cap’tan canna leave de sea for de land but once evry ten years. Ye are de king of my ocean and ye have already walked on Davey Jones’ deck. Who say ye canna walk on Will Turners?”

“Why didn’t you visit Jones on the Dutchman? Why did you make him wait?”

“I am de sea chil’, time moved for me, I am all de oceans and all de seas. Ye are one of mine but ye are of de sea not de sea. Time moves for ye as it das de Cap’tan Will Turner.”

"I have my duties here."

"Do na forget ye duty to yeself chil'. Do na make the mi’takes of a goddess."

The waves calmed again and receded. The undertow returned to tug gently at her feet. Elizabeth sat in the gentle waves as she thought about what the goddess had told her. After a moment she shook her head and put it aside. She had a kingdom to build. Her husband would wait for her just as she promised to wait for him. There would be time for her to sail again soon.

And a kingdom she built. Jack soon left with the crew and the Pearl. He snuck out of the cove at night with Mr. Gibbs babbling about bad luck sailing under a crescent moon. Barbosa chased after him on a ship he won not so fair and square in a poker game. Elizabeth thought of following them and finding the Dutchmen but her position wasn't secure yet.

One did not give away power when one was willing to burn the world down to get it.

Will would understand.

He loved her for who she was- a pirate.

Elizabeth studied the law with Teague. She enforced it fairly. Soon she noticed her courses which had been as regular as the moon did not come. She began feeling sick in the morning and in the evening. She knew enough to know the signs- every young girl did whether their mothers or governesses wanted them to or not.

She wrote a message in a bottle and hand picked a crew to go out to sea. With Anamarie at the helm as first mate they were soon in the deeps of the ocean. She threw the bottle into the ocean and commanded her crew to wait. She said a prayer to the goddess who had claimed her as her own that the message would find Will quickly.

Not two days passes before the skeleton ship rose out from the depths. Grappling hooks were thrown from both ships to bind them together as the captain of the dead crossed over to see his wife.

By this time Elizabeth had a small and well concealed bump rising from her middle.

Will had spent his entire life staring at the woman in front of him and it seemed death had no plans to change that. The pair went to the captains quarters and if they came out a little disheveled with clothes hastily put back on the Kings crew feared (loved) her too much to say anything.

Elizabeth returned to her kingdom until her last month. Her son was the son of a pirate king and the ferrier of the dead. He would be born on the goddesses waves and Elizabeth didn't give a tinker's damn what anyone thought of that.

Calypso came to the birth and cooed over the boy born on her waves. All his childhood and for the rest of his life small gifts would be found to wash up on the shore for him.

There is damnation in a woman's kiss. There is power in a womans touch.

Elizabeth chased passion from the first time she heard the word uttered from a frothing pulpit. The preacher had screamed it as a curse and Elizabeth saw the temptation of a promise.

There is death in a woman's kiss and there is life in her embrace.

 


End file.
